


Elizabeth

by localspacelesbian



Category: Andi Mack (TV)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, marty has two moms, not really a happy ending? kinda depends on how you look at it, specifically between siblings, toxic family relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-27
Updated: 2020-07-27
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:40:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,741
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25559698
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/localspacelesbian/pseuds/localspacelesbian
Summary: Marty learns about his mom's past.
Relationships: Marty/Buffy Driscoll & Jonah Beck
Comments: 7
Kudos: 11





	Elizabeth

Audrey Parker wasn’t sure what to expect when she got a call from the school, asking her to come down. It was only a few weeks into his freshman year, and he’d already gotten in trouble. A small part of her was almost impressed. She walked into the building and saw Marty, Jonah, and Buffy sitting on the bench outside the office. Honestly, she was mostly surprised that it was Buffy and not TJ sitting there, considering the chaos she’d discovered the three boys could cause over the summer.

She put her hand on her hip and asked Marty, “What’d you do?”

“Nothing!” She just raised her eyebrow at her son, and he sighed. “We got written up for PDA.”

That surprised her. For one, PDA didn’t seem worthy of calling the parents. And for two, he and his girlfriend barely did any kind of PDA, even in their house. She looked at Buffy. “Really?”

Buffy shook her head. “I’m just here for moral support. It was those two.” She pointed at Marty and Jonah.

Audrey turned to Jonah in surprise. Or… maybe it wasn’t that surprising? She was still getting used to this ‘queerplatonic relationship’ thing, but she supposed she could go with it. She nodded. “Ok…”

Marty spoke up again. “The best part though,” he said bitterly, “is that Buffy and I  _ have _ kissed before at school, and no one’s ever said anything. But the one time I kiss Jonah…” He shook his head. “Anyway, I already made sure they didn’t call Jonah’s parents, but I think I made them mad.”

She nodded. “Right. Well, come on then.” She took a deep breath, preparing to once again have to defend her son to his school’s administration (though this was the first time at the high school, so she wasn’t sure what exactly to expect.)

She knocked on the door and heard a voice say, “Come in.”

She opened the door and was surprised to see two people there: the principal, sitting at his desk, and a woman standing next to him, presumably the teacher who had written the boys up. As the woman looked up at her, her eyes went wide. The same eyes that Audrey saw in the mirror every day. And she was sure her own looked exactly the same right now. She felt her blood run cold. Everything she’d prepared to say flew out of her mind, and she felt like she was twelve years old again.

“Mrs. Parker?” The principal said, getting her attention.

She looked over and nodded, walking further into the room, Marty right behind her. “Right.” She tried to pull herself together. She was here for a reason. “Mr. Owens. What seems to be the problem?”

“Well, your son and his…” He hesitated, not sure how exactly to refer to Jonah.

“Friend,” she finished for him.

The other woman rolled her eyes and scoffed. “Friend? I saw them kissing in the hallway.”

“Mrs. Collins…” Mr. Owens said, giving the teacher a warning look.

Audrey turned to her. “Not that it is any of your business, but yes, Marty and Jonah are friends. I know that might be a foreign concept to you, but I can assure you that they exist.” She could feel the tension in the room. She felt like she couldn’t breathe. Maybe she shouldn’t have said that. She turned back to Owens. “Now, I think we all know that if Jonah were a girl, we would not be having this conversation.”

Collins rolled her eyes again. “Why do you have to make everything political? This is a learning environment. Students shouldn’t be kissing in the hallway. It doesn’t matter that they’re both boys.”

Audrey had flashbacks to high school, watching the person who was currently standing in front of her making out with her boyfriend at school, not caring if they were in anyone’s way. She thought back to her getting mad at Audrey and her first real partner for daring to kiss in front of her, the one person she was out to, the one person they could safely be a couple around back in that hick town. Audrey turned to her again, her blood boiling. “It’s not about politics. It’s my life. Our lives. I don’t care if me calling out your homophobia is inconvenient for you. And last I checked, not much learning goes on in the hallways anyway. But if you really want to stop all PDA in this school, you better be writing up every single couple, every single instance. Good luck with that.” She turned back to Mr. Owens. “I think we’re done here.” Not waiting for a response, she turned around and left the room, Marty once again right behind her. The other two stood up and looked at them, asking with their eyes what had just happened. “Come on, kids.” She walked out of the building, the three teens silently following her.

As they crossed the parking lot, she heard a familiar voice calling out behind her. “Wait, Audrey.”

Audrey stopped, closing her eyes and taking a breath. She took her keys out of her purse and handed them to Marty. “Go start the car. I’ll be there in a minute.”

He gave her a confused look, glancing back at the woman behind her. He looked like he wanted to argue, but she just shook her head, and he nodded and walked toward the car, Jonah and Buffy right behind him.

Audrey spun around on her heal to face her sister. “What do you want, Elizabeth?”

She looked down, almost nervously, but Audrey wasn’t about to let her guard down. “I didn’t know you had a son,” was the first thing she said. “Last I heard, you only had a daughter.”

Audrey was relieved when she heard her car start behind her, hoping Marty hadn’t had to hear that. “Well, you must have heard wrong because I’ve only ever had a son.” She glanced down for a second, taking a deep breath before looking back up. “Since when do you live in Shadyside?”

“Since this summer. Kyle got a job offer from this construction company in town.” Audrey nodded. “I didn’t know you lived here.”

_ I’ve only been here for 20 years… I only invited you to my wedding…  _ “Well, we do. Now, if you’ll excuse me…”  _ I’ll just be going home and trying to figure out how to avoid you for the next couple years until you inevitably move because you get bored again. _ She started to back away and was about to turn around when Elizabeth spoke again.

“Don’t you think I deserve to know my nephew?”

_ Oh that’s real rich, coming from you. _

“Your what?”

Audrey turned and saw Marty standing there. She looked behind him and saw Buffy and Jonah in the car. “I thought I told you to stay in the car.”

He looked at her. “What is she talking about?”

She tried her best to communicate with his eyes that she would explain later before turning back to Elizabeth, anger coursing through her veins. There was no way she hadn’t seen Marty standing there when she’d said that. “God, as if it’s not bad enough that you tried to use your own son to manipulate me, now you think you can use mine.”

“What are you talking about? I never tried to manipulate you. God, you’re so dramatic.”

Audrey closed her eyes and took a deep breath.  _ Nope.  _ She wasn’t going to give her the satisfaction of arguing with her. She wasn’t going to let her get in her head. She wasn’t a kid anymore. “Marty, get in the car. We’re going.” She walked around the car to the driver’s seat. He hesitated for a second before getting into the passenger seat. She leaned her head against the headrest and tried to slow her breathing.

“Mom? Are you ok?”

“Is she gone?” She asked, not opening her eyes and not answering his question.

“Yeah, I think she’s gone.”

Audrey nodded and opened her eyes. She put on her seatbelt and then turned to make sure everyone else had done the same. “Good.” She faced forward and moved the car out of park. “Now, where am I taking you kids?”

After a second, Marty answered. “Um, we were going to go to Buffy’s house.”

Audrey nodded. “Ok.”

The car was tense as they started to drive.

“I’m sorry, you have a sister?” Marty asked finally, when the silence became too much for him.

She tightened her grip on the steering wheel and nodded. “By some definitions of that word, yes.”

“And she teaches at my school?”

“Apparently.” After a few more seconds of awkward silence, she asked. “Do any of you have any classes with her?” She was stopped at a stop sign, so she glanced in the mirror to see Buffy and Jonah shake their heads along with Marty.

“I think she mostly teaches upperclassman,” Buffy said.

Audrey nodded as she started driving again. “I see.” Last she’d heard, Elizabeth hadn’t been teaching high school at all, but, she supposed, it had been a long time since they’d seen each other.

When she parked in front of the Driscolls’ house, Buffy and Jonah got out immediately, but Marty hesitated. He looked at his mom. “Are you sure you’re ok?”

She gave him a small smile and put her hand over his. “Marty, I appreciate you worrying about me, but I never want you to feel like you have to take care of me. It’s supposed to be the other way around. I’m the grown up, ok? I’ll be fine. Go have fun with Buffy and Jonah. We’ll talk more when you get home.”

He nodded. “Ok.”

“I love you.”

“I love you, too.” He finally got out of the car, and she watched him walk with the other two up to the house.

She sat back against the seat and closed her eyes again, breathing deeply a couple times before she opened her eyes and drove away.

Marty stood in front of Buffy and Jonah, who both sat on Buffy’s bed. He really didn’t feel like sitting right now.

“Well, that was…” Jonah started.

“Yeah…” Marty agreed.

“What do you think happened between them?” Buffy asked.

Marty ran his hand through his hair. “I have no idea. I didn’t even know she existed until today.” Was this why his mom had so few pictures from her childhood?

Buffy nodded got up and walked over to her desk. “Do you know what her first name is?” She asked as she sat down and turned on her laptop.

Marty walked over and stood behind her. “Um, my mom called her Elizabeth?”

Buffy nodded and opened up Facebook, typing the name “Elizabeth Collins” into the search bar. It didn’t take to long to figure out which one was her. Jonah wandered over and stood next to Marty, who instinctively took his hand in his own. Buffy scrolled down the Facebook page. It was mostly shitty memes. Like, peak Facebook Mom Memes, minions and everything. One of the more recent posts was from her son Liam’s birthday: “Can’t believe my baby boy is 25 already!! It feels like just yesterday…” he didn’t bother reading the rest. Below the message was a collage of pictures of a redheaded boy from over the years.

Scrolling a little farther was another similar post for a different redheaded kid, one who looked more familiar. “Oh my god, I think he goes to our school,” Buffy said.

“Yeah…” Matthew Collins. Marty was pretty sure he was a senior? He’d seen him around but had never talked to him before.

Buffy kept scrolling. There was a post celebrating Elizabeth’s anniversary with her husband Kyle. “Can’t believe it’s been 26 years!! It feels like just yesterday…” God, did she use a template or something? There was also a collage of pictures of the two of them, including one that looked like a prom picture?

“Of course they’re high school sweethearts,” Buffy commented.

Marty raised her eyebrow at her. “What’s wrong with that?”

She looked at him, as if suddenly realizing that they were a couple in high school. “Well, nothing, I guess, but like, come on. Look at them.”

Marty nodded his head to the side. He supposed he could see what she was getting at. He leaned in front of her and clicked on the Kyle’s name in the post. He regretted it the second Buffy started to scroll.

“Oh god, I think I can see why your mom hates these people.”

He didn’t seem to post as often as his wife did, but the posts he did make were… something. The pictures of dead animals he’d shot and fish he’d caught were bad enough, but it got worse. Everything else, aside from a few pictures of his family, was basically just Republican memes. Like, racist-ass, homophobic-ass, Blue Lives Matter, TPUSA, capital-B Bullshit. He’d take Elizabeth’s shitty Mom Memes over these any day.

Still, he wasn’t sure he completely agreed with Buffy. He shook his head. “Not that this guy doesn’t deserve to be hated for this shit, but like, my mom has talked about her conservative parents before. I’ve never met them, but at least I knew they existed. I feel like there’s gotta be more to it than that.”

She nodded. “Fair enough. But I don’t think I can look at this anymore.” She closed the tab and shut her laptop before spinning around in her chair to face him. She took his free hand in her own. “I’m sorry. I can’t imagine how weird this must be for you.”

He looked down. “Yeah…” Mostly though, he was worried about his mom. He’d never seen her so shaken up before. What had happened? He shook his head. “Hey, can we do something else?” He didn’t really want to think about this anymore.

When he got home, he found his moms in the living room, laying on the couch together. He saw two bottles on the coffee table, and at first he thought they were wine bottles, but as he got closer, he saw that they were sparkling grape juice.  _ Yeah, that makes a lot more sense. _ While Jessie occasionally drank, he’d never seen Audrey have so much as a sip of alcohol. Both bottles were empty, and there were no cups nearby.

“Hey.”

Audrey sat up from where she’d been laying mostly on top of her wife. “Hey, Marty. You’re home.”

He nodded. “Yeah.” He walked around the couch.

“Did you eat?”

He nodded again. “Yeah.”

She gestured for him to sit next to her on the couch, so he did.

“So…” He didn’t know how to ask what he wanted to ask. Or if he even did want to ask.

Audrey nodded. “So.”

“You have a sister,” he said, even though that was obvious by now.

She nodded. “I do.”

He leaned forward a bit to look at Jessie. “Did you know about this?”

Jessie laughed lightly. “I did.”

He turned back to Audrey. “Why- What happened?”

She took a deep breath. “It’s a long story.” He just kept looking at her, waiting for her to go on. “It wasn’t so much one big thing as a bunch of little things that built up over time. Some of it even seems silly now, looking back, all these years later.” Jessie rubbed her arm, and Audrey gave her a small smile. “When we were kids, she was always kind of awful to me. Well, not always I supposed. I almost think it would’ve been easier if it had been always. But there were moments when we’d get along. She claimed to know me better than anyone else, and maybe for a time that was actually true. But eventually, it shifted from normal sibling fighting to something else. It took me a long time to accept it for what it was, but it was toxic. She was always telling me what to do, and if I ever disagreed with her, she’d throw a tantrum but somehow spin it to make it seem like I was the one who was being overdramatic. And it got worse as we got older, especially as I started to question my sexuality and to pay more attention to what was going on in the world outside of our tiny town. Well, you saw how she accused me of making things political today.” She sighed. “Admittedly, I was a kid, so I didn’t always go about things the best way. In middle school and early high school, I was a bit pretentious. People thought that I thought I was better than them. That’s what Elizabeth said anyway. And even when I grew out of that and started trying to be more careful about how I said things, she still saw me as a child. She refused to see that I was growing up, and I think it’s because she still hadn’t.

“We started to grow apart when she went to college, and even more so when I went to college, but I think around the time she got married is when things got really bad. I wanted to invite my partner at the time to the wedding, but no one in the family knew I was gay except for her, whom I’d come out to only a few months prior. She assured me it would be fine, but as soon as we arrived, she took an immediate disliking to them. They were nothing more than an inconvenience to her, and I was just someone to be bossed around. I sat there and steamed her dress for two hours while she and the other bridesmaids got ready. I suppose I was supposed to be grateful she wasn’t forcing me to do anything with my hair or to wear makeup. When it was all over, I tried to let it go. After all, every bride has a right to be a bit of a bitch the week of her wedding. And things were actually kind of ok for a while after that.

“Then, she had a kid. And now maybe I get it a little better, being obsessed with your kid, wanting everyone to see how amazing he is.” She smiled softly at him and ran her hand through his hair. “And I loved him. But she expected the rest of us to be just as obsessed with him as she was. She expected us to drop everything and go visit her whenever she wanted. She’d call me and not once ask me about myself. She just wanted to talk about herself and her baby. It was basically impossible to talk to her about anything else. And I was in college at the time, you know? I was busy, and I lived in another state. I had my own life, my own friends, my own problems. And she wasn’t there for any of it. But she expected me to be there whenever she needed me.”

She took a another deep breath. “And then one day, we got in an argument. Something silly, I don’t even remember. But she said she was tired of me being a bitch all the time and acting like I was better than her. So I said I was tired of the way she’d been treating me our entire lives. And then she said I could just forget about her and Liam, like if she threatened to take her precious baby away from me, I’d suddenly start groveling at her feet and begging for her forgiveness or something. I didn’t. I just said ok. And I’ve only seen her a couple times since then, at various family events, but I didn’t stay particularly close with anyone else in the family either, so…”

She shrugged. “But it’s ok. I have a new family.” She looked at Jessie and at Marty. “Because real family has nothing to do with who you share genes with.” She looked down. “But seeing her today out of nowhere… I admit that shook me up a bit.” She looked back at Marty and covered his hand with her own. “Not that you have to worry about me or anything. I’ll be fine. I promise. I’m just going to have to get used to the fact that we live in the same town for the first time in over twenty years.” She gave him a small smile.

“And while I no longer consider her family and am not ready to let her back into my life, I understand that she is technically your aunt, and you have every right to want to know her or your cousins. If any of her boys were to show up at my door, I’d never turn them away, and I hope she’d at least have the decency to treat you the same. And hey, it’s been a long time. Maybe she’s changed. Just don’t let her get in your head. She’s very good at that. And you know, don’t go starting any fights with her or her kid at school.”

Marty nodded. That was certainly a lot to take in. He had no idea how he was supposed to respond. He leaned forward and hugged her. “I’m sorry.”

She hugged him back, but pulled back after a few seconds and put her hands on his arms. “Hey, I told you you don’t have to worry about me. I spent far too much of my life worrying about my own parents to let myself put that kind of pressure on you. You asked what happened, and I don’t want to hide anything from you, but that doesn’t make any of this your responsibility. Ok?”

He nodded. “I love you.”

She smiled. “I love you, too.”

After a short paused, Jessie asked, “Hey, who wants ice cream?”

They both laughed and raised their hands. She got up and went to the kitchen. She came back with three pints of ice cream and three spoons. As she sat back down and passed them out, Jessie said, “Ok, so explain this queerplatonic thing to me again. I didn’t realize kissing was involved.”

Marty smiled and shrugged. “Well, that part’s kind of new…” Really, the whole thing was kind of new, and they were all still figuring it out, but he was glad he could actually talk to his moms about this kind of stuff.


End file.
